Man with a Falcon (possibly St. Bavo)

For a long time no one was sure who this was, a nobleman, a knight, a hunter with his falcon. The figure is now usually identified as Saint Bavo, a wealthy 7th-century lord from the Low Countries who gave away his fortune and turned to a religious life. The falcon on his fist is the clue, since it stands for the aristocratic world he left behind. Rembrandt painted it around 1661, late in his career, when his brushwork had grown broad and heavy, laid on in thick strokes that only settle into a face once you step back. A Gothenburg textile merchant, Gustaf Werner, gave it to the city's museum in 1921, and it has hung there ever since.